Labor Federation Split to Increase Opposition to ANC

Source: Bloomberg

By Renee Bonorchis

The expulsion of South Africa’s biggest labor union from a federation that helped end apartheid will boost opposition to the ruling party and may fuel labor unrest at a time when economic growth has already been cut by strikes.

The Congress of South African Trade Unions expelled the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa, which has about 350,000 members, on Nov. 8 after it withdrew support for the African National Congress because it said the government’s economic policies are failing the poor. Numsa plans to hold mass meetings, attract more members and set up a national united front that may form a political party to contest 2016 local-council elections.

“Guillotine of +350 000 workers is a game changer and will have profound political and organizational implications -- what is to be done?” Zwelinzima Vavi, who backs Numsa even though he is the general secretary of Cosatu, said in a Twitter post. “Don’t mourn. Organize,” he said in a later posting.

The expulsion from Cosatu came after Numsa withdrew its support for the ANC four months before May 7 national elections, which the ANC won with a reduced majority of 62 percent. The union led a four-week strike of about 220,000 workers in July. This month Numsa failed to halt the expulsion through an interdict filed at the South Gauteng High Court.

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Photographer: Gianluigi Guercia/AFP via Getty Images
Congress of South African Trade Unions General Secretary Zwelinzima Vavi raises his fist as he arrives to address striking members South Africa's National Union of Metalworkers protesting on the first day of a nationwide strike called by NUMSA, in Johannesburg, on July 1, 2014


Read more: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-11-09/south-africa-metalworkers-to-boost-union-after-cosatu-expulsion.html